Stuart Broad, the England T20 captain, says Kevin Pietersen's absence has not been an issue in preparations for their world title defence. Photo: Stu Forster/Getty Images

Stuart Broad resumed the England captaincy in Durham on Friday and said his team are capable of retaining the World Twenty20 title without Kevin Pietersen.

Buoyed by an impressive victory over West Indies in England's last T20 match in June – in which Alex Hales, Pietersen's replacement as opener, hit a crowd-pleasing 99 – Broad nevertheless conceded that the fast bowlers, in particular, are feeling the effects of a long hard summer.

Steve Finn has a sore back and is likely to be rested from Saturday's first of three matches against South Africa; Tim Bresnan is again feeling pain in the elbow that troubled him for much of last winter and therefore has the potential to be more of a long-term problem; and even the captain managed to lose the nail from his right index finger during his first practice session for a fortnight – having been rested from the five-match 50-over series to allow him to do some extra work in the gym.

Broad argued that the absence of Pietersen, who was man of the tournament when England, captained by Paul Collingwood, were crowned world champions in the Caribbean in the spring of 2010, has not even been an issue in the preparations for the title defence. "Our planning started for the World Cup with the Trent Bridge game earlier in the summer," he said. "Kevin had made himself unavailable so Alex came in and scored the highest score by an England batsman in Twenty20 cricket. We've had a bit of time to get used to it because he retired in June. It was a bit of a shock when he did retire but he made that decision and we planned from then to be without him.

"We've got eight of the World Cup winners still in this squad, we've got a lot of domestic experience … so of course I think we've got a chance."

England are rated second in the official T20 world rankings, behind South Africa, as in Test cricket, and would displace them with victory in the first game of the series at Durham. Broad and AB de Villiers, South Africa's seemingly tireless captain, admitted to concern that even in this Indian summer, playing a three-match series in Durham, Manchester and Birmingham is not ideal preparation for the slow pitches and steamy conditions of Sri Lanka. The Proteas will play their opening match of the World T20 against Zimbabwe in Hambantota on Thursday week, with England facing Afghanistan in Colombo the following day.

"I'm quite conscious that we have a one game at a time mentality because the conditions are going to be very different at Durham than they are in a week's time in Colombo," said Broad, after linking up again with Andy Flower following the team director's brief break during the closing stages of the 50-over series. "But the campaign starts now in that we're together for the next month.

"You can look at the history of the World Cups and the Champions Trophies we've had at this period of time have not been particularly successful, so we have to do something a bit different. It's important we enjoy our downtime when we're out there – it's something we did very well in the Caribbean when we won it over there – because it's very evident just from our quick bowlers that we've got a few niggles floating around and they need looking after. So this time maybe we should train hard, then go and enjoy some elephants and swimming." Although possibly not in Durham.

James Anderson is likely to replace Finn in one enforced change from the team who beat West Indies, and could yet earn a late call to Sri Lanka if scans on Bresnan's elbow show a recurrence of the problem that ruled him out of the Test drubbing by Pakistan at the start of the year. Broad also hinted that the Sussex all-rounder Luke Wright could come in after impressing in a variety of T20 competitions around the world over the past year, and more recently in CB40 cricket for his county.